Skip to content

In this article

Venture Design helps you know where to focus

Updated By Marko Joensuu 3 min read

Two people laughing on a sofa in front of a photo wall – Venture Design helps you know where to focus

Key takeaways

  • Venture design is an agile approach to human-centred design, optimised for creating new businesses. It aims to take a new business from zero to launch quickly and efficiently.
  • Competitive advantages last for shorter periods than they used to. Instead of chasing one sustainable advantage, businesses now pursue transient advantage, and venture design helps them decide where to focus.
  • Companies compete on two playing fields. Work in the core business, such as refreshing a product line or improving margins on best-sellers, protects stability and is about playing not to lose. New ventures beyond the core target future performance and are about playing to win, which is where venture design is most useful.
  • To start planning, the author recommends the Ansoff Matrix, a framework for devising strategies for future growth. There is no single way to do venture design, and approaches vary with the situation of the business.
  • When research shows that a company is playing to win, four key success factors guide venture design: independence, collaboration, speed and focus.

Venture design is an agile approach to human-centered design, optimized for creation of new businesses – building them rapidly and efficiently from zero to launch. In this post, I try to discover the many advantages that this design approach brings to you.

Succeeding with transient advantage

In the past, it was quite easy to follow competitors and see what they were up to. Earlier Inc. Magazine told us that well over half of the executives from across all industries say that their main competitor in five years will be a different company than it is today. So there is a change in how businesses pursue their opportunities. Before the holy grail of business was about sustainable advantage. The life cycle of a product in an exploit phase (after launch and ramp up) was sometimes years or even decades long. Unfortunately, this isn’t the case anymore and businesses are driving transient advantage through venture design that helps to know where to focus.

transient advantage
Picture 1 – Transient advantage

Aligning innovation to growth strategy

Usually in business we have two playing fields where we want to succeed. From the business core e.g. refresh the current product line or improving margins on best-sellers. Build from the core for near term performance – playing not to lose. We have stability at stake and we are limiting failure. Human-centered design is usually a keyword here but what about the future of us? New ventures are needed that are build beyond the core for future performance – playing to win. As we enter new audiences where we have no presence we are on the offense. Our success hinges on breakthrough innovation and this is where venture design comes useful. To start with your planning I recommend an Ansoff Matrix tool that provides a framework for devise strategies for future growth.

Principles of venture design

Now you should have a clearer picture if you are playing to lose or playing to win. Should you go after more human-centered design or venture design. If your research shows that you are in the area of playing to win a couple of key success factors should be taken into consideration for guidance and optimization.

1. Independence – Grant and defend autonomy
2. Collaboration – Drive continuous engagement
3. Speed – Prioritize progress over process
4. Focus – Design the impact, not the product

What business needs now is design. What design needs now is making it about business – BETH COMSTOCK, VICE CHAIR, GE

Where does your company's digitalisation stand today? The maturity model helps you assess how digital your business is today and where to focus next.

Explore the maturity model

Venture Design approach

I wanted to share this approach with you to get you started, but as there are many custom approaches to venture design and they may vary and depend on the situation of the business, you should not see this as the only one. Don’t be afraid to get in touch with our team (or myself) to learn more and succeed in venture design. Have fun!

venture-design-approach
Picture 2 – Venture design approach

Keep up with our blog, podcast and other content

SIGN UP FOR OUR NEWSLETTER

Frequently asked questions

Venture design applies human-centred design to building new businesses rather than improving existing ones. Its goal is to get a new venture from zero to launch rapidly and efficiently.

It depends on whether the company is playing not to lose or playing to win. Developing the core business for near-term performance protects stability and limits failure, and human-centred design is usually the watchword there. When a company enters audiences where it has no presence, it goes on the offence. Success then hinges on breakthrough innovation, and that is where venture design comes in.

Transient advantage is a competitive advantage that lasts only a short time. In the past, a product could stay in its exploit phase, the period after launch and ramp-up, for years or even decades, and businesses aimed for sustainable advantage. That is no longer the case, so businesses now drive transient advantage instead.

Independence means granting and defending autonomy, and collaboration means driving continuous engagement. Speed means prioritising progress over process. Focus means designing the impact, not the product.

Sources

  1. Harvard Business Review: Transient Advantage
  2. Wikipedia: Ansoff matrix
Marko Joensuu, Digital business design at Sofokus

About the author

Principal Consultant

Marko Joensuu

Marko Joensuu is a Principal Consultant at Sofokus, specialising in Composable Commerce architectures and the integration of AI into commerce systems and development workflows. He builds with TypeScript and React, and works at the intersection of modern frontend engineering and AI-driven digital transformation. His focus is connecting technical implementation to measurable business outcomes, and guiding teams through both the technical and organisational sides of change while keeping a maintainable foundation for long-term growth.

Read more articles (26)

Related articles

Keep reading